Little Flower Academy feud with lesbian teacher sparks debate

A music teacher at Little Flower Academy who says she was fired after her partner gave birth and she applied for parental leave will not be filing a human rights complaint against the independent school in Vancouver, according to a report by CBC. The school denied firing Lisa Reimer, saying she will continued to be paid until her one-year contract expires in June.

Nevertheless, the issue has prompted a debate about the rules that allowed the school to take such action, the Sun’s Jeff Lee writes. They have been in place for decades, but some lawyers say it may be time for the Supreme Court of Canada to revisit the issue.

The last time it ruled on the matter was in 1984 after a Vancouver Catholic school fired a teacher who had married a divorced man. The court ruled that non-profit religious institutions have a right to give preference to members of the group their organizations serve.

The case was so significant that it led to the modern-day emergence of so-called “Catholicity” clauses in Catholic school teaching contracts that insist that even non-Catholic educators must respect and live up to the church’s values, Lee writes. Those clauses allow schools to dismiss teachers if they learn they are violating religious expectations, such as living common-law.

But the Caldwell case may not be in keeping with some of society’s emerging values around individual human rights, say Tom Beasley and Geoffrey Howard, two Vancouver-based employment and labour lawyers.

The Sun’s religion reporter Douglas Todd also tackles the issue in today’s Sun, describing the “ethical thicket (that is) formed when a non-profit organization discriminates against a homosexual or other protected person at the same time the organization receives funding from taxpayers.” Read his story here.

There are two sides to every story and in this we really only really see Mrs. Riemers side because she deceided to go public with it. Was this blown out of preportion? YES. It is true that LFA girls were denied rides on the bus and were harassed by news reporters. It is also true that none of the students knew Mrs.Reimer was lesbian until the story was publicized. As well most of the girls didn’t like her as a Chior teacher. She had a unproductive method of teaching and wan’t very aproachable. How do I know this? I am a student there. And for you information, we aren’t taught to fear lesbian’s or that God hates them. In fact I have never heard any Teacher, religious figure or Chatholic for that matter say such a thing. All that is asked is that lesbians don’t push thier way of life on others, just like Chatholics shouldn’t push thier beliefs on any other religion. You are entitled to your own opinion, but both sides of the story should be told.

I do not think it is right to cut fundings from the Governement to the Independent Schools. Independent, so called Private Schools, get only 50% of the funding per student that the Public Schools get. Government did not build any of the private schools, do not pay any bills that come along to fix it and keep it up. That private organization has to provide for those expenses. Parents want to keep their religious values and believes, and do not mind paying the tuition fees. That same parents pay taxes on their income and properties, that support all schools, public and private, as well as everyone else in this beautiful country. Private schools are doing us a favour to educate students for half price. I am sorry that many people see it different.

• Parents are increasingly demanding more choices regarding their children’s education. The Universal Declaration of Human Rights (Article 26), cosigned by Canada, states: “Parents have the prior right to choose the kinds of education that shall be given to their children.” First Protocol to the European Convention on Human Rights, co-signed by Canada states: “No person shall be denied the right to education. In the exercise of any functions which it assumes in relation to education and to teaching, the State shall respect the right of parents to ensure that such education and teaching is in conformity with their own religious and philosophical convictions.” • The Sullivan Royal Commission concluded that, “We therefore deem it proper that nonpublic schools should continue to receive provincial financial assistance, such aid we believe to be a normal tangible manifestation of the freedom of thought, belief, opinion, and expression guaranteed by the Charter of Rights and Freedoms. To assume otherwise would be to deny accommodation of social diversity and multiculturalism, the recognition of individual differences and the rights of parents to participate in educational choice – all principles which remain fundamental parts of the democratic system we hold dear.”

Cry me a river. This lady knew the values and belief systems of the Catholic Church when it comes to gay marriage. If she is in disagreement with their belief system, she should not be teaching there in the first place. It’s her own fault.

LFA boasts of its superior facilities and beautiful library. It requires students to write entrance exams and wants to know the occupation and marital status of the parents. And then it claims its students do so well on provincial exams, not because of their innate abilities but because of the superior teaching and small classes. All of this is subsidized by other taxpayers and parents who can’t afford these wonderful things for their own children. Why does the government think this is a good idea?

I’m not sure what you mean about independent schools not having special needs students. We have several children in an independent (Catholic) school, and practically all of the classes have special needs kids, with special needs instructors helping them. In fact every independent school I know of has special needs kids, and one student who was unsuccessful in the public system finally found the education and attention he needed in a Catholic school.

I am a student from LFA and it truly saddens me to see that so many people are so judgemental about my school and our students when they never even heard of the other side of the story. Ms.Reimer was never fired. Shes still being paid to work from home. Her contract was supposed to be a year because our other choir teacher is coming back from a maternity leave in september. Ms.Reimer was aware of all this since the contract officially ends on june 30th or 2010. The press doesnt mention how she breeched the contract by not informing the school of a 3 month advance leave of maternity leave. Did the press mention that she left the school days before the chamber choir was supposed to go to New Orleans? Did the press mention that Mrs.Reimer almost let each student, around 20, lose $2000 each by dropping out of the trip and not informing ANY of the students? Did the press mention all this? Did the press mention how our students are getting harassed and assaulted because of all this? It truly saddens me that Mrs.Reimer would just go to the ctv, cbc..etc and hold press conferences spewing lie after lie without considering the situation shes putting all the students of LFA in… I just hope that all of you would not judge our school and say such mean words like “disgusted, dicrimination, homophobic..etc’ when you DONT know the whole story

From what I’ve read, she was an on-call teacher for the Vancouver School Board. She would not be receiving any benefits or seniority while she’s away doing this temporary assignment at Little Flower Academy. Many on-call teachers have to work in two districts to get enough work for a livelihood, and if you happen to have to work longer-term temporarily at one district (eg. if you happen to cover for a teacher who ends up being away for a few months due to illness), then the other districts would let you be away for up to a year. It’s competitive to get on a district’s on-call list at all, so this is fair since a lot of graduates don’t even end up on the list. And as an on-call teacher, you can apply to temporary or permanent positions which again is a competitive process. And once you get a permanent job at one of the districts, then you can drop the other ones. And this can take up to 5 years to do, so it’s understandable that someone might take the opportunity to teach at a private school temporarily for a year if it comes up and you get the job.

Independent schools? Hardly. Private schools like LFA like to refer to themselves as independent schools rather than private schools, because “independent” sounds so much less elitist than “private”. Yet these same independent schools and parents have no trouble at all accepting public money to fund their private endeavours. Almost all private schools discriminate in choosing students and staff. Very few of them accept special needs students, except Kenneth Gordon which is a special needs school. The attitude of LFA toward Reimer is typical of attitude of all private schools – elitist and discriminatory. I am disgusted that the public has to fund these schools and disgusted that these schools would accept public money to further their elitist and discriminatory practices.

“Some facts” (otherwise known as “No Compassion”) Semantics: “the teacher was not fired”; no, just ordered to leave the premises, not permitted to teach there anymore. Don’t be ridiculous! When you are fired or kicked out on your keester, you won’t be playing silly word games. And you sure as hell won’t be calling it a ‘non-incident’. They have done a hurtful thing to Lisa which has ripples through the school and through our wider community. It is massively injurious to exclude and isolate someone and take away their job for a reason no fault of their own. The school should celebrate with her – a new baby!! Becoming a Mom!!! Instead? Kicking her out as if she should be shamed??? I would guess “Some Facts” that you have never been the oppressed minority in any sense of the word. You’ve never experienced discrimination. You’ve always been one of the haves. Talk to us if and when you have a humbling experience that shows how it feels to get the other end of the stick, and how it helped you understand people who suffer as underdogs. In a stressful situation, Lisa is taking a stand. GOOD JOB, brave lady! If the students at the Catholic school are supporting Lisa with a rainbow armband campaign, as Dawn suggests, then HALLELUJIAH!! The younger generation, when they get into management, will hopefully help wipe out the stubborn vestiges of discrimination that we older people have failed on. One hundred years ago a teacher could not marry or be seen at an ice cream parlour!! It is high time to accept gay couples EVERYWHERE. Too much energy is wasted on paranoid adults doing harm to others because they are bigoted. The price of entering the Catholic heaven, just like in the Middle Ages, is too high for mere mortals to pay.

Ok, a one year leave of absence seems fair. Do other districts still have leaves that are much longer? Does anyone know? Provincial bargaining would be better if everything went provincial or even regional. It is way too confusing right now and to try and figure it out you could spend days searching for and reading local contracts and comparing them with the provincial contract just to answer one simple question. Dawn, what is your source for the rainbow armbands comments. Is it a small handful or a large majority? This must be confusing as all heck for the poor mites.

Should have said “for educators” not “for teachers” in regards to leave of absences because it is something thevancouversunistrators get in districts as well. There are some good reasons and some not so good reasons. For example if a person is unhappy in their position it is better for everyone if they try something different and the safety net gives them the confidence to do so. But what are the rules in different districts, who sets them and how many people can take advantage of it at one time? ON the matter of letting someone go based on their sexual preference, it seems unacceptable in today’s day and age.

The teacher was not fired. LFA continued to pay her in order that her family not suffer, and is paying her until her temporary contract expires. The claim is that she is in breach of her contract; but since there was no firing or termination, one cannot be certain of what wrong has occured on the part of the school. if any. This article strikes me as highly speculative, in that no human rights case exists in this instance, nor will it. We now, however, seem to have accepted the myth by uninformed posters, and by some media, that the school fired the teacher, and that some sort of human rights tragedy has happened, and that public school teachers do not have their morality regulated or held to a higher standard than other citizens. All such claims are untrue. As to the regulation of morality by schools with regard to teachers, the courts have long held tha teachers are held, by virtue of their profession, to a higher standard of public morality than are others. It was a public school district that was first challenged on this, nor an independent school, in the case of Jophn and Ilze Shewan and the Abbotsford school district. John had taken semi-nude pictures of his wife, Ilze, and sent them to Gallery magazine. for this perfectly legal and rather modest picture, the Board suspended both teachers. The general finding, when it went to court, was that these teachers could be disciplined, even though they had not violated community standards of decency, because teachers are moral exemplars. I think that, if people want to defund any institution that articulates moral standards in the personal life of employees, then we need to defund public school districts right across Canada. It is they who have continually ar5ticulated the right to govern the moral life of teachers – and do so without first informing the teacher – no clause in the contract as Catholic schools have. Really, why do the media run such ill-informed and poorly thought out constructions of particular cases in education. No firing, no human rights case, parallel views in public and independent education…but a clear bias against independent schools. It seems systemic and hegemonic, not individual, but I just do not get the anger and sanctimonious prattling around this non-incident.

Collective agreements are not secret so, depending on the district, if someone from the public would like to see the leave of absence provisions and the process that has been agreed to (through collective bargaining), feel free. If you have a problem with the collective agreement provisions than join the many within the BCTF in their movement to go back to more local bargaining, since provincial bargaining between the centralized powers (BCTF and BCPSEA) continuously gets us nowhere. If it is fair and free collective bargaining that you are against, well, than I believe we still have many nations where this does not exist for your consideration.

you are only able to take 1 year with the VSB, which is most commonly done becasue people work in multiple districts and can possibly get temporary contracts with say burnaby, while working in Vancouver as well. This is also done for educational reasons, for those wishing to become thevancouversunistrators, get their masters or what have you. This is not a “chushy” net, this is done to keep the system working.

The school seems to be totally out of touch with the students, who have reportedly started a rainbow armband to show support for Ms Reimer. What’s being forgotten as usual in all this is the interests of the students. By all accounts, Reimer was recruited because she is an exceptionally-qualified music teacher and they are the ones who lose the most.

They didn’t renew her contract. For the rest of her current contract, they are asking her to work from home. She will continue to be paid. and yes…she’s trying to hold on to her protected union job while taking a “leave of absence” to work somewhere else.

Was she fired or did they just say they will not renew her contract when it expires? And what is all this about her being on a leave of absence from Vancouver School Board? THis is a common practice the public should be aware of, teachers holding on to the get-my-public-education-job-back-ticket for years and years. Taxpayers are providing job insurance and maybe having to pay out severance to someone else when these people bump out a current public employee when they decide to return for whatever reason. The more you find out about the cushy nest trustees have created for public school employees the more you shake your head and wonder about the meaning of the word “trustee”. Can a trustee or teacher or someone else enlighten us on the rationale for the above?